The Minetta Review

muddied handmaids hand clapp
ed close the privledged booth of
Grendel & Man. Midnight boys
with danger tucked waistbands
promise to return the story; a lo
udness in brow sweat

The apartment’s back parking lot was empty after nine a.m. a
horseshoe lining of trees for the animals to hide almost
drowning taught us how to swim Mom
gave us a flashlight for when we got scared of the dark don’t
forget to spit on yourself where I shoot you or else you’re dead.

Cars with square edges fell out of fashion the
Sunoco on the corner kept changing its logo we
played Freshman soccer for the hoodies our
best conversations happened over beer and ping-pong when
the intonation of our voices turned drunken accusations into questions of life?

ok fear whatever
ok dreams and pow ems pilgrim bottles hats and longjohns in comfort floors sometimes i need to breath sometime i write the things you read the things and maybe c ry st als yo u s ee the d ark and mayb e wel l it m akes me nor mal cry you know and it is you and tor nado but the w ar ni ng doesnt sc a re me the ta cti c wo r ks in newne ss wa ys an d a ll the ru l es ar e ju st th er e ju st f or e st s of p ap er wa s i t awes ome it was fu n wo nt y ou ju st say so met hi ng.
i will come you were had gone for recipes luck for luck naughtiness averted.

Let me buy you a drink or something strange happened to my
friend hates me now I know why they call it the bends like that
wobbling pencil trick a guy into thinking this is a dress this is my
dress this is my address do not bother calling ahead when you
ring the doorbell close your eyes and ask for Butch.

I think I see him, at his desk, biting the tip of his pen gloomily. This is the end for me.

Tell people like you what happened to you.

At length, after a long mental struggle, he sets his pen to the paper and writes:
“They were sexual deviants.”

The People of Lot. It is possible for a neurotic to get over his disturbance, and for another person to help him do so.

Subject: u wouldn’t believe what they’re doing—they’re punishing them
Subject: OH MILDRED!
Subject: how r they torturing?

He paces up and down his room for a few minutes.

Subject: Superglue up their asshole, then they were force-fed laxatives and water until their insides explode
Subject: OH MY DARLING!
The best way to live with a neurotic is to help him overcome his neurosis.
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I planned to be a tiger. Eleven feet nine inches.
Each day I hung from the rusted water pipe,
shoulders popped and tendons stretched, trying to get longer.
I licked ants straight off the tarmac, building a taste for blood.
They’re sour you know, like Warheads even,
and I had to clamp my tongue to the top of my mouth
and scrunch up my eyes and bring my head in real close.
Like a turtle seen a badger.

I remember that one belt.
The middle looked something like stucco
from when you leaned against the burner
and the cheap shitty plastic bubbled and popped.
I was keen on that one.
It hurt less than the genuine leather one from Montreal,
which left streaks against my rangy sides.
There’s violence to love. Mum carries pup by the scruff of his neck
and Toots left scratches all over my back and shoulders,
but it’s different see, she kissed my neck and eyelids.

Quite the calm clammy feeling, it was.
Her palms with mine, dripping
smothery honey dew
juices all over our breakfast
plates in the morning.

Each shining dawn we’d sit
and eat as savages eat.
In a pit of pigs,
our spittle was as spears.
The sunlight would croak

in a fit of mud and reverie
with streamers and full spectrum confetti
floating down sloe rivers, glittering
canine teeth and gin. Such was the bacon
we’d eat. Oily, like a bird in a gale

dropping, unborn, eggs upon our heads
that would crack and ooze
in our hysterical eyes
with smiling battered lashes.
And as some of misfortune did miss us,
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